How do academicians cope with occupational stressors to alleviate burnout? The experience of a research university

Purpose University academicians are struggling to engage in teaching, supervision, research and publication. The purpose of this paper is to determine how academicians cope with the various burdens of academia work stressors to overcome burnout. Design/methodology/approach A cross-sectional study was conducted from January to July 2017. In total, 327 research university academicians were selected using a proportional stratified randomized sampling. Validated measures were used to collect data on perceived work stressors (teaching, research, interpersonal conflicts and career development), coping strategies (adaptive and maladaptive coping) and perceived burnout (emotional exhaustion (EE), depersonalization and personal accomplishment (PA)). The data were gathered via computer assisted self-interviewing (CASI). The research statistical model was tested by two-steps of assessment replicating covariance-based structural equation modeling (CB-SEM) with bootstrapping procedure to generalize the sample to the hypothesized model. Findings Overall data fit the hypothesized model well (CMIN/df=1.788, GFI=0.833, CFI=0.921, TLI=0.916, RMSEA=0.047) with various degree of explanatory value for EE, depersonalization and PA were 60, 49 and 22 percent, respectively. Academicians were resilient against the burden of teaching. However, they did adopt coping mechanisms to overcome research challenges and interpersonal conflicts. The effects of research and interpersonal conflicts on tri-dimensional burnout mediated by maladaptive coping ( f 2 effect size=0.37) had a larger effect than interpersonal conflicts toward burnout mediated by adaptive coping ( f 2 effect size=0.02). Practical implications Academicians adopt maladaptive coping for research and interpersonal conflicts to suppress burnout. An integrative approach at both organization and individual levels is crucial to enhance appropriate coping mechanism to curb with burnout among the academicians of a research university. Originality/value This is the first study in Malaysia which uniquely estimate the effects of academician’s work stressors toward burnout with introducing coping strategies as mediators toward work stressors and burnout relationship which has been analyzed via CB-SEM.